An early am post - woke up at 3:30 am to distant lightning flashes (a bit like the Bob Seger lyrics) and saw that it was raining. Storms tried to move in last evening - photo above is from 6:30 pm looking toward Redington Pass. However, it was not very unstable over the metro area and storms weakened as they moved to lower elevations - composite radar below is from 8:30 pm MST on the 24th, when it was raining lightly here.
Now the radar shows (above is for 3:30 am on the 25th) a wide rain and thunderstorm band across much of eastern Pima County. These echoes are moving northward, as the weak, inverted trough at 500 mb has apparently inched to our west. Satellite IR image below is for 3:00 am and indicates considerable cold cloud temperatures still with this band. So, quite a nice morning surprise.
I just checked the ALERT data and found that, since 5:00 pm last evening, this has become essentially a 100% coverage event (only two sites at the far northwest corner of the network have not measured rain). Amounts appear to have generally been from a couple of tenths to nearly an inch at several higher elevation sites. The CG flash density plot at the bottom (from Vaisala and Weather.Graphics) is for the 2-hours ending at 3:45 am - showing the band of storms down here and also some thunderstorms up in Maricopa County.
Needless to say, it will be an unusual summer day, with the widespread morning rain followed by what will likely be a suppressed and muggy afternoon.
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